Jim Roberts Says Mashable Readers Might Get ‘News Assignments’

The intriguing headline revelation comes from today’s summary of a conversation the New York Times vet had with Beth Andrix Monaghan (pictured), co-founder of Boston PR firm InkHouse.

Monaghan describes herself as a longtime personal fan of Roberts, having come to trust his voice-of-reason approach to the fury of today’s breaking news patterns. When she asked the recently appointed Mashable executive editor and chief content officer how the site’s audience might be involved in that process moving forward, Roberts gave an intriguing answer:

The audience will continue to play an important role in the development and sharing of the news at Mashable. Jim views this as “mobilizing the audience to report out the subject.” In its most simple form, it could mean asking for readers to share photos. But Jim envisions giving out news assignments to readers, which is interesting to me.

At InkHouse, the most successful social media campaigns are those that ask for a specific action. Jim wants to, “Let the audience know that they have a stake in the content and that Mashable wants them to be contributing in a high-minded way.”

It’s a testament to Roberts that he has given one of his first additional interviews to anything but a conventional “big” outlet. It suggests the incoming Mashable exec has a firm grasp of the organic nature of the Internet. Read Monaghan’s full summary here and check out her firm’s cutting-edge client list here.